A Little Birdie Told Me
by Atlin Merrick
Summary: A series of silly stories and serious inspired by really marvelous tweets by the Sherlock writers, directors, actors, and producers. Most will be slashy John and Sherlock, but who knows who else and what else...only Twitter knows for sure.
1. Salt, Fire, Babies & Evil

**Salt, Fire, Babies & Evil**

_~ Fire ~ _

"We don't have enough hands to do this."

Sherlock grunted, tried to reach around John. "We…do. If you'd just lean forward a little…I can nearly touch it."

John leaned forward a little, winced a lot, shoved his back against Sherlock's front. "No, no, no, you're going to break me in half."

The long man made a long arm round his lover, bending him hard over the edge of the kitchen table. "Just move to the right and—"

John hissed as hot wax drizzled over his skin. "Sherlock I'm-Going-to-Kill-You-Now Holmes, I am now wounded in action. I am hurt. You have hurt me. Are you happy?

Sherlock pointedly did not tell John that he'd accidentally dribbled hot wax down his own _neck_ sixteen seconds ago. It did not seem wise.

"All right. Just stop moving. Stop. We're mostly smart men, one of us may possibly even be a genius—"

An annoyed grunt from the genius.

"—if we stop and think for just a second we can figure this out."

They stopped. They thought.

_Minutes later…_

"Okay, great, fine, this should work. Are you ready now?"

A spidery conglomeration of arms and legs, Sherlock shifted his bum on the kitchen table, gripped the thing in his left hand more firmly.

"Now?"

Sherlock spread one lean leg slightly wider. Wriggled a bit, spread it a little more.

"Now?"

He adjusted the thing in his right hand, then clenched his crazy prehensile toes tight around the lit candle.

"Now?"

The consulting detective tutted in exasperation. "What is your _hurry,_ John?"

There are no rhetorical questions at 221B. So of course John answered. "There's fire, as in _fire_ on our kitchen table. I've already been indirectly burned, you've already been indirectly burned—"

Sherlock will never get used to John's _seeing,_ not when everyone else is so blind.

"—and you're sitting there in nothing but those pretty purple pants I bought you last year and a nice shirt that would probably go up a right treat, and you wonder why I want to get this over with?"

Sherlock frowned. John had a point about the flammability of the linen.

Carefully placing the bowl of bat guano and the turkey baster of egg albumen onto the table, Sherlock stripped off his shirt. He thought briefly about removing his pants—

"If you take those pants off and I have to watch you accidentally set fire to your genital hair again I'm leaving you. I will go and find a man who's dumb as a post and gets the _Financial Times_ for the pictures and watches daytime telly at night with a little cat on his lap and drinks decaffeinated tea with plain biscuits because the other kind give him heartburn and I will forget all about the smell of your blazing privates and the sound of my own screams and I will be so bored I may want to set _myself_ on fire but at least I'll know what to expect day in and day out. Are we clear?"

Sherlock's eyes narrowed, great big brows lowered like storm clouds. "You've given this some thought."

John sighed, reflected that he had not seen his life going in precisely this direction. "No, not really. I'm just wildly fanciful, remember?"

A term Sherlock may or may not have used three and a half times last week in regards to John's blog.

"Now, can we continue or would you like to sort of set your entire limb in wax?"

Sherlock glanced down at the lit candle clenched in the no-seriously-they're-crazy-long-and-prehensile toes of his right foot. White wax oozed from it, to the table, and had—while John talked about _leaving__—_gathered in a hot pool round his heel. That explained his moderate-to-intense discomfort of the last half minute. Right. Well then. It was time to experiment before something bad happened.

"Now listen closely John, in order to verify the suspect's alibi we have to do this exactly as she said she did it. So when I say three, I'll squeeze the albumen over the guano. You wait one second—no more, no less—and inject the vinegar, _then_ the gunpowder. Vinegar. Gunpowder. _Then_ we'll see if the proximity of the flame even matters. I really bet it doesn't."

_"One…two…three."_

Oh damn-hell, it so completely did.

...

_~ Evil ~ _

"I didn't even know toenails and fingernails could burn."

"Shhhhh."

The alley was dark, damp, and dirty. Alleys always are.

It was raining. The overhang above them did not hang over quite enough. They were soaked right through.

"I mean I'm a doctor. Technically I should have known that."

_"Shhhhhhhhh."_

The thief was due down the alley in precisely ten minutes.

"I also now know that simple candle wax makes a very lovely furniture polish. Really, the kitchen table's never looked so good. Another thing I—"

Sherlock just gave up and put his hand over John's mouth. Which was really rather good because the thief showed up early.

After that many, many things happened quickly, and then one thing moved as slow as cold treacle.

First the thief's three compatriots showed up almost immediately, then one was so eagle-eyed he spotted John and Sherlock behind the skip without so much as their toe-tips showing.

They moved fast, those men, their shouts loud in that close space, their flying fists invisible in shadow.

John and Sherlock gave as good as they got, gave better really because they were faster, and so there were shouts of pain, there was a dash and scramble for the stolen item, there was success, and the men of 221B were actually grinning as they turned sharp on their heels, ran toward the end of the alley and then, right then, the shot rang out and everything froze except Sherlock's fast and fluttering heart.

Open-eyed, slow-blinking, he turned in time to see John twist around hard, harsh, angles all wrong as his hands went up, striking the alley wall and even though he knew it was impossible because he was much closer to the gun when it went off than John was and so his ears were no doubt ringing, even so Sherlock knew he heard it when John's forehead struck that god damn brick wall, it was exactly that loud, and Sherlock knew bullet had met bone and that in the next instant John would fold at the knees and the waist and neck—precisely in those spots, Sherlock knew this because he'd seen it dozens of times looking down at dozens of dead bodies bent just in those places and maybe he'd seen too many, he realized, maybe he'd seen far too many corpses collapsed down and in and on themselves because in death muscles won't keep you upright and your body will fall naturally along its simple folds and so he waited for John's body to do exactly that but John didn't, he didn't fall, he turned instead and looked toward Sherlock, eyes wide with panic but Sherlock was fine, it was good, it was all good—and then time moved as time ought and in a flash they were gone, the silly rare shell that would never be worth dying for shoved deep in John's pocket and later their client would thank them with a bonus big enough to cover the rent for a year but right then, right then, both men ran into the night, their heads and hearts suddenly full of all the riches they'd ever need.

...

_~ Babies ~_

John tended to his own split lip and eyebrow.

Standing in the doorway of the loo, arms tight across his chest, Sherlock squinted through long lashes, watched the good doctor sew the wound over his eye shut. He was anomalously quiet as John kept up a running commentary, the good doctor both stone cold sober and so full of adrenaline he was as sloshed as a squirrel on fermented nuts.

"—and I can't believe you didn't hear yourself! You were yelling like a blue-painted Pict, so help me."

He'd numbed the area with a topical cream, but each time John pushed the needle through his own brow Sherlock grunted, a low deep sound.

"—you were a brilliant banshee, I swear to god. I almost started applauding. Jessup was so stunned I just plucked that stupid shell out of his pocket like I was taking candy from a kid—"

It was only three stitches, and they were small. As a matter of fact they barely showed. Sherlock felt nauseous anyway.

"—the gun scared the shit out of me though. Every time I figure I've got the criminal element sussed they do something like that—"

John dabbed at the stitches with some iodine. He winced. _Now_ he winced. He'd kept a stoic face through the entire _surgery_ portion of his visit with Dr. Watson, and _now_ he winced in pain. Sherlock bit his tongue to keep from talking.

"—I mean thieves aren't supposed to shoot people, right? One crime isn't like a gateway drug to another, that's what you're always telling me. Robbers rob, arsonists arson, and generally everyone sticks close to their own little world of bad. There. Perfect."

The small man stood tall, gazed at himself in the mirror, liked what he saw. "I look devil may care. Sort of bad arse. It suits me."

Right about then most of John's bravado and all of his adrenaline high dissipated. He slumped against the wall in that over-bright loo and muttered, "God I'm tired." And yet the good doctor smiled.

"Nothing quite like a violent tussle in an alley to make you want a good dinner, a decent shag, and maybe someone to carry on the old family name, you know." John's smile quirked. "Hits me sometimes, that. Did tonight. The idea that it'd be nice if there was someone to carry on after us, you know? Know what we did and who we were."

John's voice had not gone precisely wistful, just a bit meditative. Then he yawned and laughed. "Then I think, no thank you, babies are all well and good, but at forty it'd be—"

"Shut up John."

John huffed-laughed. He rolled his head along the wall, reached out and lightly rapped his knuckles against Sherlock's chest. "Hey, you, be nice. It's been a long night."

Sherlock shook his head, first one direction then another, knowing exactly what he meant to say but not saying it.

"I was joking 'bout the baby bit. And the decent shag bit. You're a bit better than decent, you're—"

"Shut the _fuck_ up, John."

John went right ahead and shut the fuck up out of sheer surprise.

Sherlock stalked off, trailed immediately by a man whose jaw quite literally hung open.

"It's not a god damn joke, John."

Sherlock stood utterly still for one long second, then started pacing the sitting room in tiny erratic circles, caged by his own rage. "It's not a fucking joke to, to, to _joke_ about. Dying is _dead."_

Every instinct told John to reach out, but he didn't. Most wounds are best cleaned by bleeding a little.

"And babies don't do anything but puke and piss. They won't keep you safe or make you immortal or bring you back if you die."

Each foot fall was heavy, as if the thin man carried a thousand pounds, as if his anger and his pain had actual weight.

"Because dying is dead John, and nothing fixes that, nothing ever, ever fixes that."

John concentrated on breathing and not reaching out, breathing and not reaching out.

"I can't breathe. I can't breathe. I can't breathe. John, John, John…"

John reached out.

...

_~ Salt ~_

Every couple has their own little…predilections.

John licked. "Perfect."

This was one of theirs.

Wrapped round each other in the dark, Sherlock licked his own skin, just left of the wet spot John left. "No. Not seasoned enough."

Sometimes, after a chase—and there really aren't as many as legend would allow, but there are a fair few—they'll come home and very pointedly not wash off the adrenaline and the night mist, the dust and the smoke and the sweat.

Their spit still damp on his long arm, Sherlock wriggled till the bed springs squeaked. He dipped his face to his lover's neck, swiped a broad tongue over John's jugular vein. "Now there, that's perfect."

John laughed low, murmured, "No fair, I can't get at my own neck, how'm I gonna taste if…"

Sherlock nibbled behind the spot he'd licked, made a soft needy sound.

Words. Words…what are they? John temporarily wasn't sure.

"I'll tell you what's here then," Sherlock whispered, biting soft again, tongue tip darting out right after. "Mmm…bravery. I taste bravery." Sherlock licked again. "And tea." He kissed a trail from John's neck to jaw to chin, licked there next, his tongue rasping over a day's growth of beard. "I taste patience—too much of that—and also temper. I'd have expected more of that honestly."

The good doctor laughed soft, shifted until he was on his back on the bed, arms and legs spread, a buffet on offer. Sherlock grinned, rose, hovered over him, then dipped his face to a nipple, licked.

"Need…never expected that. And I didn't expect it to taste this good. Amazing." He sucked the other small bud into his mouth, ruminating. "Tea again. How do you do that? Taste of tannins and bergamot and milk?"

John laughed, tried to tug Sherlock up, but the good detective resisted, fascinated by those nipples and the goosebumps painting John's ribs in tiny shadows.

Then he relented, followed the pull of strong hands, laid himself long over John.

"Salt. We need more salt, don't you think?" asked the good doctor, pressing his legs tight against Sherlock's hips.

Remember, there are no rhetorical questions at 221B. And what do you know, John Watson just happened to have a hand slicked up well and good with lube and so he answered his own question with action. He reached between them and put that lube to the purpose for which it was intended.

Sherlock huffed out a low breath. Jesus, Joseph, and Mary he really was rather ready.

"You're really rather ready there, my love."

Sherlock growled. "Shut up John, and get that hand off me. I've got places to go with this thing."

About five seconds later _this thing_ was put to the purpose for which it was intended. And that was to roll John's eyes up nearly to the back of his head.

"Oh dear god yes."

The bed squeaked a lot. That was new. Sherlock moaned a lot. That wasn't. Pounding away inside the good doctor, Sherlock swore a blue streak. That was new. John chanted, "Oh god, oh god, oh dear fucking god." That wasn't. Sherlock fisted two hands in John's hair and drove in harder. That was new. John responded to the fuck-yes pleasure by scratching his lover's back. That wasn't. Sherlock made a mess of things, coming far faster than he usually did. That was new. He shook and groaned and pushed deep as the orgasm took its sweet time playing out. That so very much was not.

Afterward he tucked his head at John's neck, tickled the good doctor's nose and mouth with that rampant mess of hair, and long minutes later, just as John felt Sherlock's muscles go soft and figured that was it for the night, his lover raised that shaggy head and licked at John's sweat-slick shoulder, "Salt. Salt. Salt. I need…I need…"

They both groaned with pleasure-pain as Sherlock pulled out, then the long man slithered slow down the small man's body until breath pooled hot at a still-quite-hard-thanks-so-much cock.

"…I need…"

You could have been in that bed with those men, you could have been lying right next to John Watson or just about on top of Sherlock Holmes and still you wouldn't have heard the last few words he said before Sherlock slid a hot mouth over an even hotter erection. But the one man who _needed_ to hear it did, and later he would answer, but right now all John did was spread his legs wider and fill his hands with a beautiful, crazy, sweaty mess of dark hair and smile as Sherlock whispered, "I need…I need…

"…you."

_This fic was inspired by Mark Gatiss' frankly god damn brilliant tweet: "A long day involving salt, fire, babies & evil. Actually, pretty much an average day." And because I need to start another series like I need flaming privates, I'll start writing stories based off great tweets (Tweets? "A Little Birdie Told Me...get it? *cough*) by the writers, directors, producers, or actors of Sherlock. If you come across any you think wonderful, please share!_


	2. Bespoke Lingerie

**Bespoke Lingerie**

It's always for a case.

Usually.

Sometimes.

Maybe not.

John, at this point, doesn't know. John, as of right now, doesn't care.

Because when the man that you love for his brains and his beauty tells you that today he's going for a lingerie fitting—no wait, let's rephrase that—when the man you love for his brains and his beautifully long legs and his unbelievably lush bum and his incredible neck tells you that he's about to purchase a bit of _bespoke __lingerie_ you may be forgiven for not giving one teeny tiny hot damn as to exactly why.

"What now?"

That was John's initial response. That, along with a full body flush, a sharply indrawn breath, and a split second visual of doing Sherlock up the arse while he lay back on bolts of silk.

John closed his laptop. Frankly his blog could get fucked for now. The good doctor cleared his throat. "Uh…what now?"

Sitting the other side of their desk, Sherlock closed his laptop. He knew this would happen. If he were a betting man he'd have put good money down on John reacting exactly this way. You don't have to be a consulting genius to know that John _will_ eventually get used to the double-handful charms of Sherlock's arse, the ceaseless length of leg, or the way Sherlock sometimes parts his lips and those legs at the same time, but six months into their relationship the detective knew for sure that today was not that day.

"It's for a—"

John lifted a hand. "Don't say it. You don't have to say it ever again. Unless proven otherwise, when you brush your teeth I presume it's for a case. When I butter my toast I presume it's for a case. When you tug my trousers and pants down and do me on the stairs I…presume…"

John got briefly diverted by that recent memory, refocused two minutes later to find Sherlock had left the sitting room and was in the kitchen. The good doctor rose, followed, continued as if he'd not interrupted himself.

"…it's for a case. You could sell me off to a roving band of randy nomads and I will assume it's for a case. So you don't ever have to say that part. You just need to explain _why."_

John sat across from his sweetheart at the kitchen table, watched as the man began persecuting a bubbling yeast broth with denatured alcohol.

"There are nearly countless subsets to every sexual predilection, John." Sherlock's tone was perhaps a teeny bit lofty, as if he were about to teach his lover a thing or two.

Dr. John Watson remained attentive. There was nothing about his expression that said, _About __sexual __kinks __kindly __tell __me __something __I __don't __know._ His open gaze didn't hint at the hours he'd spent in A&E removing strange items from rectums, vaginas, and urethras. His smiling mouth did not detail the abashed kink confessions he'd heard at surgery. No, John did not say anything at all because sometimes Sherlock needed to feel superior in order to feel even remotely equal.

"Cross-dressing, for example. There's a subset of people who are sexually aroused by men in heels. By men in makeup. Or by men in fancy lingerie."

John pointedly said nothing, as loudly as he possibly could. Eventually Sherlock noticed the roaring silence and looked away from his enfeebled yeast.

"Those people are called me, Sherlock."

Lately it always seemed as if Sherlock's got a pipette in his hand when John surprises him. Freud might have had something to say about that one.

Sherlock clutched the pipette a little tighter. "Oh really?"

John said more nothing, quietly. And this time what that quiet said was:

_Go ahead, love. _

_Do it._

_Deduce me._

A crooked smile flashed fast over Sherlock's face. Oh yes.

Sherlock's had exactly one lover in his life: This one. Most of his hands-on knowledge of sex comes from a single man: this man.

So when he and John became a couple, Sherlock had very little knowledge of…pretty much everything. Not that you need much in order to get it on, to which the billions of babies on this globe are testament. The point is, Sherlock went from the smartest man in the room to simply the most willing the night he and John became lovers, and six months later a balance still hasn't quite been reached.

Yet to his surprise Sherlock likes being a student. Providing John's the teacher. But Sherlock also likes being the master, doing the thing he knows so well how to do.

John won't ask Sherlock to deduce his thoughts very often. The good doctor's quite happy to say what he's thinking, thanks so much. But sometimes, just sometimes, this will be John's foreplay. Instead of opening arms or legs, he will open his mind. He'll let what he thinks and feels move his body for him, he'll let his thoughts flit clear as day over his face. He'll be an open book so that his lover can touch him in the way he feels most sure: with that big brain.

So John said nothing, just grinned at Sherlock, and it wasn't even three second in and already both heard the deepening in John's breathing.

"You love my height," Sherlock began. "You think it makes me look strong but at the same time my slenderness makes me appear taller than I am, which lends me a fragile air. That…let's call it an indomitable delicacy," a small smile again flashed fast over Sherlock's face, "…makes you fist your hands."

Under the kitchen table John carefully unclenched the hands resting on his thighs. His smile grew just a little.

"So heels, yes, you'd like to see me in tall heels of…" Sherlock contemplated briefly. "…at least four inches. They'd emphasize my height dramatically, and while the power-play between strong and fragile should confuse that libido of yours, you're—" another grin "—a complex man. So just the thought of me wearing—" Sherlock stared right at John's beautiful eyes. "—mmm, dark blue stilettos and nothing else has already started getting you hard."

John didn't _say_ "brilliant," but he licked his lips, then let that tongue tip sort of stay in view awhile.

"You also think I'm beautiful, specifically my eyes and my mouth." John shifted minutely and Sherlock added quickly, "You love all of me, yes, I know, from my 'crazy cacophony of hair,' to my 'absurdly sentient' toes." Another flash of a smile there and gone—this kind of deducing was serious business. "But everyone's got predilections. You do. Even I do."

Another tiny movement from the man across the table and this time Sherlock grinned wide. John is a secure man, but even the confident want to know how others see them.

"I'm learning what mine are through you. I'm learning mine _are_ you. You love my delicate height, I love your sturdy lack. When I hold you or am held by you there's…the sense that nothing could take you away from me, that you're exactly that sturdy, that solid, that _there."_

Sherlock tapped a finger to his chin. "I'd like to see you in heels I think. However, the very thought of that got you making fists again—and not in a good way—so let's move on."

"While you insist you love all of me, your predilections concerning my beauty are precise: You love my mouth and my eyes. So deep is your devotion that you wouldn't want them well-painted because then I wouldn't look like me. No…" Sherlock pursed the lips of that lavish mouth, looked into John's dark eyes again. "You'd want the coy tease. A dark smudge of kohl, a rosy stain on lips."

John didn't _say_ "amazing," he just dropped his chin and lifted his gaze and sort of stayed that way.

Sherlock's mouth thought about going a bit dry, but his brain was busy and barreled ahead, kept him talking. "I think my favorite part of your body right now—it changes often, which surprised me at first—is your throat. Maybe because I know how sensitive the neck is, both yours and mine, and yet there it is on display every day for others to see. Always there for me to look at, to imagine where I've been on it and what I've done to it."

John saw that the pulse in Sherlock's throat had ticked up by nearly ten percent. A good doctor notices these things.

"You're not quite sure what you'd want to see me wear though you definitely know you want whatever it is to be dark because I so very much am not. That's why you don't want me in stockings, you want to enjoy the way the heels and the lingerie offset my paleness."

Here's where Sherlock stopped deducing and looked in his own mind's eye. _What __would __look __pretty __on __his __pretty __body?_

"The lingerie should be something sheer," Sherlock bit his lip, almost tasted a rosy little lip stain, "and black and tight. Something that laces over chest and crotch but is a little too small. Small enough so that a generous swathe of skin shows through the laces."

The detective and the doctor actually sat there for a moment counting the fluttering beats in one another's neck.

"Which means I best get measured for something like that today because the fittings I planned are for other things entirely. I was going for expediency so thought beribboned knickers or mesh catsuits or dark hose and garters. I had no clue what to buy and so I—"

Sherlock correctly deduced the curling of John's toes, the clenching of his fists, and the now-screaming hard-on hidden under the table.

The lanky genius finally put the pipette down. The yeast was long since dead anyway. "Now?"

In reply John briefly cast his glance south. "If your experiment can tolerate," John stopped, cleared his throat so he sounded less like a man about to make an obscene phone call, "your absence for five minutes or fifty, I'd—"

Sherlock stood. Went so far as to rise on tip-toe, standing still and tall on imagined heels. "Will you come, when I go for the fitting?"

John stood, shrugged his shoulders so that the collar of his button down shirt tugged away from his neck a little. "I'm going to come right now. And so are you. And yes, later too. There if possible. In the back room or the loo or the cab we're definitely getting."

Sherlock didn't feel badly about digging the heels of his shoes into the kitchen table a few minutes later, mostly because he was too busy trying to get his trousers down around his ankles. He didn't feel badly about it later either because every time he sees those three inch scrapes he remembers John stripping with great speed and mounting the table just before mounting him.

John _will _feel badly about the scuff marks and the table's new wobble, but being as every time he notices either in the future he also hears Sherlock moaning, he feels Sherlock's hips rising, and he also sees again hot white spurts of come as they spatter over Sherlock's hairless belly, John's regret will take the odd form of labored breathing and a biting of the lips.

And frankly neither of them will feel badly in a few hours, when they're at the tailor and they use the plush, well-appointed gentleman's loo for a furious rut.

While they are thus engaged, the owner of the shop will sip his tea and eat several cream biscuits in the warm, hushed fitting room. His great grand-papa started the store, and it was way back then that the family discovered this unique way of boosting revenue.

Silvere & Son, Inc. have fitted three sitting prime ministers for pretty camisoles. They've taken the measurements of well-known lords and legal minds, they've hand-crafted lace panties and bustiers, fingerless silk gloves and arse-less bodysuits for award-winning actors and artists, household names and very old names. When, nearly one hundred years ago, they couldn't at first locate fishnet stockings that would fit a man's generally beefier, longer leg ,they became specialists in crafting that particular item themselves, from the sourcing and spinning of the cotton, to determining the sexiest diameter for the netting's holes.

So, with such a heritage behind him, and his own thirty years of fitting fine gentlemen for fine silks and satins, Sir Cameron Silvere—it will always be simple discretion that prevents him from telling you exactly which royals he has fitted, or which appreciative set sought and gained for him his knighthood—understood exactly what was happening in the gentleman's lounge right now.

Silvere was glad he'd got the sound proofing put in both the men and women's rooms all those years ago. Of course he'd been much younger then, but the unrelieved erections he'd had to cope with after his customers had "stepped away for a moment"—well they'd been his least favorite part of this really rather marvelous business.

Cameron Silvere nibbled a biscuit contentedly and thought perhaps, when the men emerged, he might suggest to the pretty one that he try the blue lace-up briefs or perhaps the velvet gauntlets with the silver embroidery and—

Ah, here he came now, with his tall sweetheart.

Time to continue the fittings.

_ _This series, "A Little Birdie Told Me..." is inspired by tweets from Sherlock cast and crew. However, a brilliant writer calling themselves Cumberholmes tweets as well, and said in reference to Sherlock two words that I could not let go: Bespoke lingerie. __The result was this story. Cumberholmes, the stilettos are in the mail. I hope I got your size right._ _


	3. Monkey Boy

**Monkey Boy**

"I _like_ monkeys."

"Shut up, Sherlock."

The detective's gaze became distant. He tapped his chin with a long finger, not even close to shutting up.

"Monkeys. They're quite similar to humans in some important ways, you know."

"I'm warning you. Shut it."

He'd once had a case with a monkey. A wildlife researcher had brought a rescued Tufted Capuchin home to London. The monkey hadn't figured in the slander/libel/assault case but Sherlock had no way of knowing that at the time. Because he is a thorough man the good detective had researched monkeys in general and Capuchins in particular to the point of actually advising the researcher on the tiny creature's diet.

"Monkeys smile, for example."

John counted to ten forward. He counted to ten backward. He regretted even opening his mouth. Possibly ever. "Seriously, if you do not shut up I _will _bite you."

The little Capuchin had bitten Sherlock, too. Sherlock had been very tempted to bite the blighter back but he was a bigger man than that. Literally. He was quite a bit larger and had sensibly concluded that fisticuffs between himself and a two pound primate would border on the ridiculous. Elsewise he'd _so _have totally bit the damn thing. But that's not the point…

"Actually that's not really true. About the smiling. A monkey's smile is actually something of a warning—a warning about biting as a matter of—"

John kicked Sherlock in the ankle. Hard. Being as he was sitting over a metre from his lover this took effort, focus, and good aim.

"Ouch! Why are you kick—"

"Gentlemen."

Greg Lestrade entered his office one second before tyrant toe-tip met slender-boned ankle. Whatever happened next he decided he would automatically side with John.

Sherlock scowled at his sweetheart, then scowled at Lestrade. "Certain army doctors are self-conscious this morning and I'm trying to soothe—"

"You could have just _listened_ to John instead of saying what you did."

Sherlock sat up straight. "You don't even know what I said."

Greg took a seat behind his desk, cocked his head. Said nothing.

Sherlock slumped petulantly. "That's not the point."

Greg pursed his lips, again remained silent.

Sherlock crossed his arms over his chest. "The point is that I _like_ monkeys, that was the whole point."

Greg hummed wordlessly and started counting in his head. He knew from past experience that Sherlock was painfully slow on this sort of uptake. Greg often got to twenty, twenty-five even, before Sherlock—

"Oh."

Only eight this time. The stupid genius was actually getting brighter. Probably John's influence.

_"Oh."_

Greg had no idea what revelations were occurring because he had no clue what they'd been discussing, but he did note John's marginally less aggrieved expression.

"I'm sorry, John."

John's crossed arms uncrossed, fingers laced magnanimously over his knee. "Thank you."

"I just meant—"

At Greg's glare Sherlock actually shut it. For a moment Greg was kind of giddy. The moment passed because Sherlock started talking again.

"You don't though, you know."

John sniffed, pursed his lips, touched the back of his neck. It was about then Greg noticed.

"Oh. You got your hair cut, John. Looks good."

It was Sherlock's turn to look aggrieved slash mollified. "I told you."

John re-crossed his arms, glowered. "No, _that's_ not what you said at all."

Greg gave in. Detective inspectors are naturally curious creatures and he could not stand it one moment more. "What, for heaven's sake, did you say?"

John went all tight-lipped, going so far as to pooch his lips out a bit, um, monkey-like.

Sherlock, still thinking he was in the right, shrugged. "John said he didn't like his new cut. I simply complimented him on it."

John stood up, glared down. "You annoying little runt—" No one thought to call John on this wildly fallacious insult. "—I said that this god damn haircut makes me look like a startled monkey with enormous ears—" As he spoke John gestured wildly at his own head, his motions so erratic he poked himself in the ear. "—and _you_ bloody well said you like monkeys. _That's_ not even on the same cricket pitch as a compliment you clot."

"But I—"

Greg clucked his tongue until both men shut the hell up. He had three case folders burning a hole in his desk right here right now and he desperately needed the help of the two big babies across from him.

"Sherlock."

The man with that name looked at the DI. He grunted.

"Even you aren't that stupid. Stop pretending agreeing that John looks like a monkey—you don't—by saying you like monkeys is the same thing as telling him he looks nice. If it were you'd be beaming at being called a clot. Everyone knows how much you like blood. So. Kiss and make up and then shut up because we've got work to do."

Greg Lestrade is a very good detective inspector. He is, however, an even better mediator slash diplomat. Those few words were all it took to cause the two big babies across from him to smile at one another in a fond slash bordering-on-publically-inappropriate way.

John leaned toward Sherlock, hands on the arms of his chair. "I like clots."

Sherlock reached for John's ears, caused them to stick out. "No. You still don't look like a monkey."

They kissed longer than was strictly necessary but Lestrade said nothing—for much longer than was strictly necessary.

"Stop looking at John's arse, Greg."

Gregory Lestrade agrees with John Watson: Sherlock Holmes is definitely a clot.

_This is the third in a series of stories inspired by tweets from Sherlock cast and crew. This one from a Steven Moffat tweet on 11 Nov 2011: "Finally had my haircut. Now look like a startled monkey with enormous ears." If you come across brilliant tweets by anyone connected with Sherlock, please send along and I promise to pooch out my lips monkey-like and send you a cyber smooch._


	4. All Out of Sorts

**All Out of Sorts**

"I hate you."

_"You_ hate _me?"_

"You shouldn't have given them to me."

"I didn't give them to you."

"You shouldn't have let me have them."

"How old are you?"

"Not old enough, apparently."

"You can fight in a war and drink legally and sign for packages, you can control your own urges, Sherlock."

"Apparently not."

"Do you even _try?"_

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Let's look at each word one at a time and—"

"Shut up John."

"If I have to sit on the floor in a public loo and rub your stomach and dear god listen to you complain my reward is not having to shut up."

"You hate me."

"I thought you hated me."

"Only because you so clearly hate _me."_

"Oh god, you've been poisoned."

"Yes, by your hatred."

"If you'd eaten wine gums instead of allsorts I could pretend you were drunk and this was the alcohol talking. Instead I know it's just _you."_

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Let's look at each word—"

"Shut up John."

"Hmm, are you feeling a bit of déjà vu?"

"I think I'm about to vomit again so my tentative answer is yes."

John removed his hand from Sherlock's belly, waited patiently for the puking. He's a doctor. He can 1) wait patiently 2) wait patiently for puke. As a matter of fact—and we're veering wildly off topic here—if John was given a vigorous rogering for every time he's been puked on over the years the good doctor would never be able to sit down again.

When Sherlock's 'déjà vu' was over he lay back on the cool loo floor and began rubbing his own belly.

Back pressed against the tiled wall, legs tented over Sherlock's, John huffed. "You didn't have to eat them _all_ you know."

"I _wanted_ to eat them."

"Did you want to throw them up as well?"

"Technically, no."

"Technically?"

Sherlock huffed, as if the answer was obvious.

"You're a disgusting, nasty man Sherlock Holmes. I wondered why you told me to leave your…leavings."

"Did you see the colours?"

"They were difficult to unsee."

"The orange, blue, and green in the allsorts seem to digest quickly, but the pink and yellow retain their colour and were far more vibrant."

John Watson had pretty much nothing to say to this.

"I can't make conclusion with one data set, but preliminary results imply we could determine time of death based on the vibrancy of allsorts in a corpse's stomach. Providing they'd eaten some beforehand."

"If they'd eaten the frankly _heroic_ quantities you just did the damn things were probably the _cause_ of death."

Some childish part of Sherlock—which is to say most of him—was pleased John found the volume of his liquorice consumption impressive.

"If I'd known you would fall on that bag like something starved I'd have…" John licked his lips.

Sherlock read John's lascivious mind which, in this instance, was as easy as spotting a neon sign that has suddenly appeared throbbing between your legs. "Frankly I may never eat another allsort again. Wine gums however would comfortably secrete themselves in more places."

"Why Sherlock?"

"Because wine gums have fewer corners and so can be shoved—"

"No, you barmy berk, why? That bag was nearly a kilo. One kilo."

"I was—" Sherlock rode out a brief wave of nausea, patted his tummy comfortingly, "—sublimating."

John moved Sherlock's hand away. "Rub, don't pat. Patting jars. Rubbing soothes." John began to rub. Sherlock sigh-moaned in a soothed way.

"What were you sublimating?"

"My hurt to your studied indifference."

The urge to pinch passed quickly. John continued rubbing.

"I thought I hated you. Hate is not indifferent."

Sherlock closed his eyes aggrieved. "I'm aggrieved, John."

"You do know I don't know what aggrieved means and haven't for every single one of our years together."

"My point exactly."

John's hand temporarily stilled. Sherlock groaned. John's hand rubbed. "What now?"

"Five years John. The anniversary of you limping into my life occurred five years, one day, and two hours ago."

John blinked. Calculated. Dropped his jaw. "Oh."

Sherlock never remembers things like this. Except the times he does. The good detective belched. Everyone waited to see if that was a precursor to more déjà vu. It was not.

John cocked his head. "So if the anniversary of when we met was five years, one day, and two hours ago, why did you eat so many liquorice allsorts you're fetching up sick in a public toilet again?"

"You take me for granted. I had to do something dramatic."

"So you stole candy from Greg's desk—stuff he'd bought for his three nieces and one nephew, candy purchased to feed _four—_and you joined Greg and I in the Met's cafeteria—'Want a proper lunch Sherlock, my treat?' I remember Greg saying that—and you methodically bit off allsorts layers one at a time until even that old woman with the eyepatch could see you looked kind of green—so that I—who you maintain is taking you for granted despite the fact that I just bought you—and let you last night use—that four-way speculum—and despite the fact that I am sitting on this cold floor and rubbing your gurgling stomach in a surprisingly sweet-smelling gents—because your feelings were hurt and you wanted me to notice you?"

"Obviously."

Sherlock belched. John smelled liquorice. Obviously.

"Was there any reason you didn't just _say_ something my love?"

Five years on and endearments still do it. Sherlock would never have thought himself a man who _feels his insides go soft and mushy_ but he's a man whose inside go soft and mushy when this man calls him love, or sweetheart, or—

"Honey, I'm so sorry."

Sherlock stuttered a big sigh. Stilled John's hand on his belly. John began to smile, to say—

Sherlock shoved John's hand away, sat up, puked noisily.

After a few disgusting moments the silly aggrieved man took a deep breath, felt his husband's head press next to his as they both gazed into the toilet.

"The yellow seems to be breaking down finally. The pink is still hanging on like a trooper though."

Sherlock rested the side of his head against the side of John's. "I'd like you to know that even when you take me for granted I'm aware that you're extraordinary and the perfect man for me."

"Thank you Sherlock."

"You're welcome, John."

"I love you."

Sherlock's answer had a lot of _pink._

_"These Liquorice Allsorts won't eat themselves," tweeted Mark Gatiss, 20 Dec, 2011. Six words giving rise to over a thousand vomitous one. Yay me and Chocolamousse, who graciously sends me so many wonderful tweets by the Sherlock folks. And yes, I'm aware my boys vomit, get drunk, high, or otherwise physically compromised absurdly often. This is not a trend I see abating. P.S. I went and bought allsorts to see what all the shouting—um, puking—was about. I tentatively like them except the coconut layer. Coconut and liquorice do _not_ belong together._

_**MORE!** I'm no longer publishing on FFnet as they don't want NC-17 content, so please visit atlinmerrick dot livejournal dot com if you'd like to read more, or Tumblr or Twitter, and eventually everything will be on AO3—please follow!_


	5. Half-Hearted

**Half-Hearted**

"Look at them."

"I've been looking at them for five hours and forty minutes. At this point I'm unaware of a time _before_ them."

"They're like cute, hyperactive psychopaths in uniform."

John glanced at Sherlock to see if he would be corrected, but the word sociopath remained unuttered. John went back to looking at the children dashing around the playroom.

"Did you see that?"

John nodded. "I've never seen one do that for real. Only in American sitcoms."

Sherlock shook his head. "All that hair and the squeaky voice and then the _biting._ She's like a rabid kitten."

John nodded, mesmerized, unable to look away.

"Another one, just there. Why do they communicate that way?"

The good doctor, who has himself been bitten by tiny humans over the years, shrugged. "Because they're small, weak and powerless, but the human jaw can exert well over 200 pounds of bite force?"

Sherlock looked away from the mirrored, one-way glass and at his…lover. After only four days he was not even remotely easy with the term. "Repeat and expand."

John squinted, leaned forward, watched a wee black boy and a petite white boy choke each other half to death. "I once—" He shook his head as soon as the boys started laughing. "—got bit so viciously by a three year old I needed stitches." John squinted again, leaned forward, peered through the glass. No, the tiny Asian girl was not kicking the toddling Caucasian boy in the bollocks. "That said, a little snapping turtle can exert a thousand pounds of bite force, so it's all relative."

Sherlock was supposed to be watching the children. Or rather, he was supposed to be watching the five caretakers in that roomful of children, as one of them was smuggling drugs via one of these rabid little—these active, tiny people.

However, John was doing that John thing again. The thing where he's casually, almost carelessly, entirely more interesting than he has any right to be.

Sherlock watched the small man lean toward the one-way glass, start to smile as a pudgy two year old drunk-walked toward what looked—to her—like a mirror.

"Say something else obscure and interesting, John."

The good doctor was kneeling, about to tap on the glass, when the chubby little girl shrieked at her reflection so unexpectedly and maniacally John actually clutched himself.

"Jesus Christ on a!" The doctor shot to his feet and fell back against the glass, petting his own chest. "Tachycardia. Whew. Yeah. Wow. Tachycardia. Um, in really bad cases it can cause a heart to beat four hundred times a minute."

Sherlock reached out…hesitated…then forged ahead and petted John's hand as it petted John's chest.

"S'a bit not good."

They both stopped petting. "The tachycardia," said the good doctor quickly, both their hands pressed over his heart, "the tachycardia's what's a bit not good. It…uh…"

They'd lived together for two months before this. Before _they_ became _them,_ before touching stopped their tongues, or looking one another in the eye set hearts thrumming.

They were a little over four days into their life-long romance and it still felt divinely strange to suddenly be awkward, to worry about an ill-phrased phrase, to wonder if this was all some colossal misunderstanding.

John blinked at Sherlock, who blinked right back at him. At this instant in time neither knew a lot of things.

* They didn't know who the drug smuggler was. (They would.)

* Neither quite knew the other was in love with him. (That knowledge soon.)

* Neither had any clue what John was going to say next. (3…2…)

"Skin, muscle, bone, even your heart has sensory receptors," whispered the doctor.

Sherlock thought about this, then nodded, unsurprised. After only a few days into the first and only romantic relationship he'll ever have, Sherlock's body senses-knows-yearns for John with every one of those things.

His skin hives with gooseflesh when John touches him in public, one of a dozen physical responses he can't control.

When John presses his mouth against any part of him the muscles in every part of him contract, curling his long body toward his lover.

When John leaves whichever bed they're in, Sherlock's bones actually ache—his marrow full of iron and John magnetic north.

And then there's the matter of his heart…

Sherlock rarely holds his tongue, is forever rattling off the contents of his head whether or not anyone's there to listen, but after their first night together he'd gone a little quiet, too unfamiliar with that heart to share what he found there. Though really there wasn't much…

…_now, always, ever, I will love you…_

"I love you," John said suddenly, as they stood there behind mirrored glass. Though they'd known one another less than ten weeks, and though constraint should have been natural, the good doctor's life had orbited the dead or the dying for so long he discovered he simply no longer had an appetite for reticence.

He did have an appetite for other things. So many other things. He caught Sherlock's wrist, tugged him close.

"You started forming these fingerprints," he said, kissing whorls and deltas, "when you were just a twelve week old foetus."

Leaning his long front against John, Sherlock whispered the word _brilliant_ into his sweetheart's mouth. John breathed in that soft huff, then slid his tongue between warm lips.

Sherlock grunted his approval, wondered if he wanted to nibble or suck that tongue, settled quickly for an inquisitive pull.

"Hey," giggled the good doctor. "We can't make out at a crime scene."

Ah, yes. Crime scene.

Sherlock looked up, over John's shoulder. Five nannies threaded through the energetic group of eighteen two- and three-year-olds. Each adult looked Buddha-benign, holding baby hands, soothing tantrums. Of course one was not quite what they seemed.

Sherlock was acutely aware that John, pressed between his body and the glass, was carefully watching him carefully watch _them._

"I see you upside down," John said softly, failing to follow his own directive as he kissed that whisper against the smooth flesh of Sherlock's jaw. "Did you know that? When I look, the lens of my eye flips you round and then my brain turns you right side up again in less than a blink and through all that and by some miracle your coat stays at your knees and your crazy hair at your ears and even though I want to catch you, you don't fall, except…" Mouth against neck, jaw, cheek, and then laughing John said, "Except I did. It was me. I fell."

It took a whole minute of soft kissing and pulling at Sherlock's hips for John to realize he probably needed to spell it out, exactly what he'd just said, because Sherlock wouldn't come to a conclusion without data and so John had better give him clear, unambiguous data.

"For you, you ridiculous, over-confident, insecure, arrogant, enthralling creature. Do you see?"

We see so much through peripheral vision.

While Sherlock looked down about seven inches to a man in front of him, his peripheral vision detected a woman fifteen feet distant and on the other side of plate glass doing something strange. She knelt behind a small quiet boy and looked left as a child to her right fell and began sobbing.

Sherlock saw. Saw her not seeing what she was paid to see. Saw a rather short man leaning against plate glass and looking up at him. Without watching her he watched, and in the half-light that hid them behind a mirror, he said to the short man, "Falling hurts."

John sighed, pushed them apart a little, turned. There will be thousands of moments in this romance when the good doctor will grow a little tired of being the strong one. This was the first in those thousands.

The moment was short-lived however; most will be. John looked at now mostly-quiet children as caretakers coaxed the last of them toward naps. "Not if someone catches you," he said. Then John hushed because he needed his lover to do some of the heavy lifting.

But Sherlock failed to rise to the occasion. It wouldn't be the first time, it wouldn't be the last.

And then on the other side of the glass John saw, too. The gentle press of a fat, fuzzy toy into a sleepy child's small hand, a baby pacifier taken carefully from his mouth and pocketed.

"Did you see that?"

"Yes."

Twenty minutes later the police where there.

"It's the Caucasian woman with the black hair."

This was her first time working with 'that Holmes bloke,' and young detective constable Superior had a dozen questions, but she barely drew breath on the first before Sherlock added, "The dummies. You'll want to look inside all of them."

A brigade of 'but hows' pushed the DC's tongue against the back of her teeth but she'd heard about this tall one. No one could quite explain it but he kept _getting things right._ She ignored the small man, just like everyone else usually did.

Years down the line—when the young detective constable was a detective chief inspector and very far from young—she'd forget that there was ever a time when she could look at Sherlock Holmes and not see beside him John Watson. Whether John Watson was there or not.

...

John's a patient man. That's fortunate, because without that patience, his and Sherlock's lives would have gone in entirely different, but similarly dismal, ultimately fatal directions.

It wasn't until that night—in bed and ten hours later—that John's patience was at last rewarded. That's when Sherlock finally figured out how to do his share of heavy lifting.

But first there were other things.

Shifting languidly, side-by-side under the bedsheets, they took turns taking hold of one another's faces, kissing, then nuzzling gentle along a jaw, then kissing again.

Twining fingers they tugged each other close, arched away, pressed near again and then everything stopped when a leg slid over a thigh, a thigh pushed between two legs, and only once all four limbs wrapped tight around each other did they start again, one mouth seeking the other in street-light dark.

"Lips are a hundred times more sensitive than fingers," John murmured, dragging the tips of his across the wet curves of Sherlock's mouth.

Reaching down in the shadowed light, Sherlock took hold of his own cock, breathed soft, "More."

John closed his eyes, the better to feel his lover's tongue pushing slick and slow between his suddenly-still fingers. "Mmmm, our hearts…they beat a hundred thousand times a day."

Sherlock hummed in approval, stroked himself lazily.

"Though yours…" John slid his hand down to Sherlock's chest. "…yours beats much more slowly."

Sherlock's heart refuted this when another long kiss set it pounding.

"During…" the good doctor huffed when Sherlock thrust his tongue inside his mouth, once, twice, three times. "…during orgasm, your heart rate spikes to well over a hundred beats a minute."

Sherlock let go of his cock, slid both hands along John's bare chest, up to his neck, then settled them firm either side of John's head. The good doctor grunted, just in that moment learning how much he loved the feeling of those big hands taking hold of him.

There's a limit to human sexual response—per act orgasms are usually about one to a customer—but there may be no boundaries to human _sensual_ response. It'll be years in their future yet, but one weekend John and Sherlock will wonder how long they can keep each other aroused, hearts ramped from their usual lazy lub-dub, and so they'll spend most of that long weekend kissing gently, caressing softly, whispering and touching and tasting, and only once Monday paints the windows with morning light will they give up the experiment as lost because there is no answer…because there is no limit.

They don't know that for certain right now, but after an hour of this, of slow, slower, slowest exploration of one another's lips and teeth and tongue, of brushing fingers slowly over the curves of ears and noses and eyelids and feeling their pulses thrum steady and fast the whole time, well they sure are beginning to suspect.

"For the heart, sex can be like going for a bit of a run. Only naked."

The good doctor giggled, high and breathless, a sweet sound which set Sherlock to wriggling closer—no, no, wait, John's mind corrected, Sherlock actually _undulated,_ the better to seat himself more firmly against John's bare thigh, wrapping both of his around it to leisurely hump.

"Oh god, but when you do that, my heart thinks I'm running a marathon."

Sherlock pressed his forehead to John's mouth and quite against his will wanted to say something endearing, to maybe offer himself as John's prize at race's end. But Sherlock didn't, he didn't, he _still_ didn't do any of the heavy lifting.

There were, as yet, those other distractions.

Sherlock's had exactly no lovers before John. There were a few frantic touches when he was a teenager, an embarrassing number of fever dreams well into his early twenties, but when he clamped his thighs around John's leg to rut harder, when he slid his hand down between his lover's legs and slowly palmed his erection…well he'd done these things exactly never and the very act of doing them made Sherlock's brain buzz itself almost quiet.

So he did more.

Pressing a kiss between John's collar bones, he looked down and under shadowy sheets so he could watch his hand as it manhandled John's cock, watch _his_ touch make John harder.

And oooooh the absolute perfection of this made Sherlock go…staticky.

It was _just_ like that, an indistinct, tuneless, white noise coming from low in Sherlock's chest. John knew instantly that it was a moan trapped deep, a raw, needy sound Sherlock was suddenly shy of making.

That was just fine, John would be bold enough for two.

Sliding a hand over then past Sherlock's busy-busy hand, he took hold of his own balls and started kneading, groaning softly, barely breath.

And as the good doctor suspected, Sherlock replied on instinct, answering John's cry with a lusty moan.

"John…"

"Tell me. What is it?"

Sherlock didn't tell, because Sherlock didn't have the words yet for this—for desire, for what John's body made his body feel.

So he answered with a sweet-soft head-butt and he moaned through closed lips and he didn't look away, absolutely did not look away from watching their hands move together over John's body.

If Sherlock _could_ have figured out his words right then they'd have likely mortified him right back into silence anyway, because the words would've been positively adolescent and on the order of _oh god I want to come, I want to John, I need to John. I want _you_ John, I need _you_ John…_

Sherlock was saved from this by the unexpected appearance of what will be, at 221B, a most rare thing: The quickie.

That is to say, right now a pair of orgasms are going to make a sudden, rampaging appearance, but within about fourteen hours and twenty two minutes from the moment they do, John and Sherlock are going to fall into a habit they'll maintain throughout their long and lusty union—the habit of teasing the holy fucking hell out of one another by prolonging most sex acts as long as possible.

Right now, however, things were heating up. Sherlock was so riveted by what was going on down below he'd sort of jammed his chin to his chest so he could watch them work John in unison, and John was so absolutely turned on by the sounds Sherlock now made on his own, that he was sucking a salty-damp lock of Sherlock's hair as if it were Sherlock's salty-damp cock.

Down below John squeezed and pulled and rolled and pinched. Down below Sherlock jerked him fast then slow then fast again, and there was the first inkling thought of a tease forming there between them, someone was having the idea that it'd be sexy to stretch things out, but then Sherlock went and messed-up-slash-improved everything by slicking his thumb through his own pre-come and sliding that thumb over the head of John's cock.

And right there, Sherlock started coming, and because he was coming he was suddenly also grunting, moaning, groaning, a little bit begging and that's when John keened high and soft around that big fat curl in his mouth and ejaculated all over their bellies, the sheet, and Sherlock's hand.

So stunned was each man over the unforeseen ending to their lovemaking that no one uttered a single word for an entire minute. A minute they spent catching breath, spitting out curls, and making a rather good job of cleaning up with discarded pants.

Finally, after collecting a blanket and drawing the drapes, after five kisses, another head-butt, two sighs, and the quick and curious taste of a different curl, Sherlock rolled onto his back, John curled to his side, and while softly nibbling a sweaty neck John whispered, "Well my love, that may be all the interesting things I know about the human heart."

The good doctor grinned, slicked a fingertip slowly through the sweat on Sherlock's chest, a leisurely, looping glide from nipples to navel. Only after he stilled did they both realize he'd written his own name on Sherlock's body.

And that's when John's smile fell away and, just like those stealth orgasms, moodiness made a surprise appearance. Suddenly so very tired of a _lifetime_ of heavy lifting, John let his hand go limp, smudging through that phantom signature. "I was wrong. I know one more. One more important fact. Grief, it turns out, really can break a human heart."

John went so quiet they both had to listen close to hear. "I had a patient once. The day after his wife died, this perfectly healthy man had a heart attack. And then, so help me, he had one every year on the anniversary of her death. For three years. For _three_ years. Until…until he didn't anymore."

Now, right now, was the time for Sherlock to choose: find the words or forfeit. But there was no choice. If you think Sherlock was going lose this thing he's had for four days and a handful of precious hours, minutes, and seconds, lose it when he could barely imagine living again for one moment without it—it being love, passion, need, salvation, all of the above—well you don't know a certain Mr. Holmes.

Pressing John's hand hard against his chest, Sherlock did it again, he took hold of John's head with one big, surprisingly-gentle hand and he knew knew _knew_ that about this he was the stupidest man on the whole street, he didn't understand so many things about this_,_ all of it, the sweat of it, the need of it, the _heart_ of it—things John knew on instinct. But Sherlock did what Sherlock always does when he desperately needs to figure something out, to _think: _He talked.

"I always thought caring was a disadvantage."

In the ten weeks they've known one another they've joked over dead bodies, one has killed for the other, and they've each offered to die, but here's the thing: Grand gestures in the heat of the moment can be deceptively easy to make. But small promises whispered in the dark…they can feel as if you're tip-toeing across a minefield.

Fortunately John's patience is complimented by Sherlock's daring. "Except it turns out that caring makes me try harder, look deeper, listen more closely. I had no idea."

Sherlock's grin was lost in shadow, but John could hear it in his voice, "You're a confusing man, bossy and quiet, profane and kind…I don't understand you, I fight you on instinct, some days I want to pick you up and set you in a corner so I can go on being the me I was last year, but you're persistent, a tiny tank of indomitable will and suddenly I want someone to be proud of me, someone who calls me an idiot and amazing, someone better than I'll ever be."

Sometimes there's barely any light in John's bedroom. It's one of those divine almost-attic type places, creaky and full of strange angles, with heavy drapes that keep out the day as well as the night. So Sherlock didn't see John open his mouth to refute, he deduced it, like he'll deduce a thousand other things over the years…

…how long John can be kept on the edge before he swears himself blue…

…what John buys him for his fiftieth birthday…

…how long John will give him to do a little heavy lifting…

"Hush, John. I didn't say smarter. You're not and never will be—" Sherlock deduced and dodged the kick aimed at his ankle. "—but better? Oh yes."

Sherlock rolled onto his lover, held him still by going boneless and heavy on top of him. "Who takes the time to touch much less teach a rabid dog?"

Sherlock closed his eyes against the dark, against John's neck, and said softly. "Because I am. Rabid. Extreme. Maniacal. I'm too much of everything and I'm _proud_ of it, and so I'm not going to change."

Sherlock kissed softly. "Except I already have."

For a long time Sherlock's believed his only value was locked up tight behind a citadel of bone. His brain was everything he was, everything he thought everyone _else_ thought he was. His long legs, beautiful hands, rare eyes, and crooked smile? They where as invisible to him as the photons that make up light.

And then there was John.

Like everyone else John recognized the brilliance of Sherlock's brain and said so. And like no one else John Watson recognized the soft skin of him, the need and heat of him, the beating heart of him. He put a hand over that heart and said, "It's there, I feel it beating." And then he put Sherlock's hand over his own and whispered, "You make mine race."

And just like that Sherlock saw his own eyes, hands, his teeth and tongue and toes and whatever else John touched and kissed and praised. And for the first time in forever Sherlock felt bigger, more, maybe even better because of this small, average, extraordinary creature.

"I'll never be everything you think I can be. But I've learned I can be more. And though I probably won't try half so often as you wish, I'll try to be more than even that. Because…"

Sherlock pressed his forehead to John's, closed his eyes again, shy, uncertain, probably scared. "…I love you."

The good doctor is not a big believer in 'you complete me.' He thinks every man and woman must complete themselves. Still, that doesn't stop John from believing something else.

"I think for a long time I had…half a heart. For all those years, for all those other people…I had just half a heart." He wrapped his arms tight around his lover's back. "Then you went and gave me all of yours."

There wasn't much more talking after that. There was other things.

_This series of stories is based off tweets by the folks who make _Sherlock. _On 16 December 2011, our dear Mark Godtiss, um, Gatiss tweeted: "__Children are like tiny, cute, hyperactive psychopaths in uniform. I'm watching teachers trying to herd them like rabid kittens." That inspired this._

_And _this_ is the last in the "A Little Birdie Told Me..." series. I've got entirely too many open-ended stories in progress and need to pare down a bit. Thank you for reading this one._


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